Unit I

Unit Summary

The world’s people were fundamentally divided into two regions: Afro-Eurasia (Eastern Hemisphere), and the Americas (Western Hemisphere).

In the Americas, there were many different cultures. In two areas, Mesoamerica and the area along the Andean mountain spine, there were states and empires with large cities supported by advanced agricultural techniques and widespread regional trade. In 300 CE, the Maya were building a powerful culture of city-states, and Teotihuacán in central Mexico was one of the largest cities in the world. These two centers traded with each other. In the Andes region, the state of Tiahuanaco extended its trade networks from modern-day Peru to Chile. While these two regions were probably not in contact with each other, trade routes crossed much of North and South America.

Within Afro-Eurasia, there were many distinct cultures that spoke their own languages, followed distinct customs, and had little contact with other cultures. However, across the center of Afro-Eurasia, many cultures were connected by trade routes. These trade routes were across land, such as the Silk Road between Central Asia and China, and across seas, such as the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. Luxury goods, such as silk from China or frankincense from the Horn of Africa, traveled from merchant to merchant across Afro-Eurasia from the Atlantic to Pacific Coasts, but the merchants themselves did not travel that far (Trade Circles). A small group of elite people (wealthy, land-owning, ruling, noble, religious leaders) in each of those cultures bought imported luxury products. Besides trade goods, travelers on the trade routes carried ideas and technologies from one culture to other cultures. Missionaries of Buddhism and Christianity spread their religious ideas. In 300 CE, the regions of Afro-Eurasia were much more connected to each other than ever before. However, they were not as connected and intertwined as they are today. In 300 CE, the most important influences in each culture came from within that culture, rather than from contacts with the outside world.

Although there were hundreds of different cultures in Afro-Eurasia, there were four empires, states, and cultures that dominated the center of Afro-Eurasia. These were the Roman Empire (Mediterranean Region and Europe), the Sassanian Persian Empire (Southwestern Asia), Gupta Empire (South Asia), and China (East Asia).

Migrations continued to be important change factors. Along the northern edge of the agricultural regions of China, India, Persia and Rome, in the steppe grasslands, pastoral nomad societies moved east and west. Some formed mounted warrior armies which attacked the empires of China, India, Persia, and Rome and disrupted commerce on the silk roads and land trade routes across Eurasia. In Oceania, Polynesian explorers used outrigger canoes and navigational expertise to expand their settlement to new islands across the Pacific. In Sub-Saharan Africa, Bantu-speaking farmers were expanding southward and founding communities, mixing with or displacing older cattle-herding and foraging populations and expanding town and trade networks.

Between 300 and 600 CE, the disruptions caused by the migrations and attacks and the decline of some empires (such as Han China, Parthian Persia, and the Western Roman Empire), made these turbulent times for many peoples of the world. The number of big cities declined from an estimated 75 in 100 CE to only 47 by 500 CE. But in other areas of the world, the networks of trade and interconnection expanded. As trade across the Sahara increased, Ghana emerged as a new commercial kingdom along the southern edge of the desert. The routes expanded southward to Aksum in East Africa, which flourished as a center of Indian Ocean trade. In the seventh century, a dynamic period of trade and cultural interchange took hold across Afroeurasia. Trade and the spread of religious ideas between societies in Afroeurasia increased again.